KDAF — BrandWiki

KDAF

callsign	KDAF
city	Dallas, Texas
branding	CW 33
digital	32 (UHF)
virtual	33
affiliations	33.1: The CW for others, see
owner	Nexstar Media Group
licensee	Tribune Media Company‡R1R‡
location	Dallas–Fort Worth, Texas
country	United States
sister stations	WFAA, KFAA-TV
airdate	September 29, 1980
callsign meaning	Dallas and Fort Worth
former callsigns	KNBN-TV (1980–1984) KRLD-TV (1984–1986)
former channel numbers	Analog: 33 (UHF, 1980–2009)
former affiliations	VEU (1980–1982) SIN (1981–1984) Independent (1984–1986) Fox (1986–1995) The WB (1995–2006)
erp	780 kW
haat	537 m
facility id	22201
coordinates	32.54306°N, -96.95917°W
licensing authority	FCC
website	cw33.com/

KDAF (channel 33) is a television station licensed to Dallas, Texas, United States, serving as the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex's outlet for The CW. It is owned and operated by the network's majority owner, Nexstar Media Group, alongside ABC affiliate WFAA (channel 8) and independent station KFAA-TV (channel 29). KDAF's studios are located off the John W. Carpenter Freeway (State Highway 183) in northwest Dallas, and its transmitter is located in Cedar Hill, Texas.

KDAF launched in 1980 as KNBN-TV, which aired several types of specialty programs, including business news, subscription television, and Spanish-language programming. Metromedia acquired the station in 1984, converted it to an English-language independent station as KRLD-TV, and made the first of several efforts at local news. When Metromedia's television stations were purchased in 1986, KRLD-TV became KDAF and the Dallas–Fort Worth outlet of Fox; this continued until 1995, when a major realignment of affiliations saw Fox partner with another station and sell off channel 33. Tribune Broadcasting owned the station from 1996 to 2019; during this time, it was one of the most successful affiliates of

Prior history of channel 33 in Dallas

Channel 33 was allocated to Dallas in 1966 as part of a settlement between two applicants that had been competing for channel 29: Maxwell Electronics Corporation and Overmyer Communications. In order to give each applicant a channel, Overmyer suggested moving channel 27 from Tyler to Dallas and substituting 33 for 29, with Overmyer taking 27 and Maxwell taking 33.[2] While the Overmyer application ultimately was dropped, Maxwell's channel 33 went ahead, launching as independent station KMEC-TV on October 1, 1967.[3] It was one of three new UHF independent stations in the Metroplex in six months (KFWT-TV [channel 21] had signed on September 19 and KDTV [channel 39] would debut in February 1968), and it was the first to fold. On October 25, 1968, Maxwell announced it was taking KMEC-TV dark and selling the station to Evans Broadcasting Company.[4]

Evans did not restore KMEC-TV to operational status. Instead, it sold the construction permit in 1971 to Berean Fellowship International,[5] which returned channel 33 to air as KBFI-TV on February 21, 1972. Berean, a locally based Christian ministry, operated the station as a family-oriented, general-entertainment independent with weekend religious programming.[6] KBFI-TV lasted 10 months, closing on Christmas Eve.[7]

The Portsmouth, Virginia–based Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) purchased the license and returned channel 33 to the air on April 16, 1973, as KXTX-TV. It was CBN's third operating television station, after WYAH-TV in Portsmouth, and WANX-TV in Atlanta. As did CBN's other independent stations (and KBFI-TV), it maintained a general entertainment and religious format.[8] However, just two months later, Doubleday Broadcasting, the owner of KDTV which had sought to sell or donate the facility to a nonprofit organization, opted to donate the channel 39 license to CBN, which paid for $1.2 million in program contracts that had dampened interest in Doubleday's offer from educational groups.[9] On November 14, 1973, KXTX-TV's programming and staff moved to channel 39, using the KDTV license and studio facilities.[10]

KNBN-TV

In 1974, the National Business Network applied to the FCC for a new construction permit to launch a new station on that allocation, which was issued on June 13, 1977.[11] NBN was a locally based group operated by Nolanda Hill and Sheldon Turner (both of whom, who had previously successfully lobbied the Dallas City Council to have a cable television franchise established in the city, each owned a 40% interest); other investors included, among others, radio broadcaster Gordon McLendon, who had made previous failed attempts to launch a UHF television station in the market and served as a commentator on precious metals once it launched.[12]

The current television station that would become KDAF first signed on the air on September 29, 1980, as KNBN-TV.[13] It operated from studio facilities located in a converted warehouse on 3333 Harry Hines Boulevard near downtown Dallas. The initial programming format consisted of business news programming during the daytime hours; evenings, meanwhile, were occupied by the subscription television service VEU (owned by Gene Autry's Golden West Broadcasters), featuring a mix of feature films, specials and, during the NBA season, Dallas Mavericks game telecasts.[14] Golden West had purchased the franchise from Subscription Television of America, a company led by Dallas Cowboys owner Clint Murchison, as well as that company's franchises to operate in Chicago; Atlanta; San Francisco; and Providence, Rhode Island.[15]

The original mix changed within a year when the station added programming from the Spanish International Network in the early evening hours.[16] In March 1982, the remaining business programming disappeared after Turner was not able to build a national syndication base for NBN's output, and KNBN-TV began devoting its entire conventional broadcast day to Spanish programming from SIN.[17] When VEU bought the subscriber base of rival service Preview, the service transitioned from channel 33 to KTWS-TV channel 27 beginning in December; the decision was taken because the contract with KTWS-TV offered more flexibility for expansion than that with KNBN-TV, and Turner and Hill were reported to be unhappy with VEU.[18][19]

Metromedia ownership as KRLD-TV

In 1983, Hill Broadcasting sold KNBN to New York City-based Metromedia, which already owned independent stations in five of the six major U.S. cities where it owned television stations, for $15 million; the sale was finalized on November 8 of that year. While KNBN continued its existing programming, it was immediately apparent that it would not last for long. Though Hispanic leaders protested the change at the Metroplex's only Spanish-language station, it was to no avail, as Metromedia sought to switch to an English-language format that would attract advertisers.[20]

On July 29, 1984, the station's call letters were changed to KRLD-TV to match radio station KRLD (1080 AM), which became a sister property to the television station after Metromedia successfully sought the FCC for a waiver of its cross-ownership regulations to let it retain KRLD radio and the UHF station.[21] (This made channel 33 the second KRLD-TV in Dallas; the call letters had been used on channel 4 when it was co-owned with KRLD until 1970.) That same day, channel 33 relaunched as an English-language general-entertainment independent. Its operations relocated to studio facilities located next door to KRLD radio at the station's current facility on John W. Carpenter Freeway on the northwest side of Dallas. The new studio facilities, which replaced the Harry Hines Boulevard site that incoming anchor Quin Mathews called "a dump" and "a warehouse that had not even been disguised effectively as a television station", also included a newsroom, accommodating the centerpiece of KRLD-TV's programming, a 7 pm newscast.[22] The newscast, along with plans that were ultimately delayed and aborted to start a local news service at Metromedia's WFLD-TV in Chicago, were part of securing the ability to co-own KRLD radio with the UHF station.

The new KRLD-TV was entering a very crowded marketplace, one of the justifications made by Metromedia in securing the waiver. Its competition included KTXA, KXTX-TV, and KTVT, the latter of which was the leading independent in the market at the time. Months later, KDFI debuted on channel 27 after it was sold to a group that immediately dropped the VEU programming.[23] Even under Metromedia, one of the country's largest owners of major-market independents, channel 33 continued to underperform as most of the stronger programs available on the syndication market had been acquired by either its rival independents or by the market's network affiliates; the station also struggled to define a clear programming identity as it heavily incorporated movies, reruns, and children's programs, while the shows it did air were repeatedly moved to different time slots in hopes of shoring up their ratings. The station attempted a coup to improve viewership by acquiring the local rights to syndicated reruns of Dallas and Dynasty for a reported fee of up to $38,000 per episode, only for neither show to pull decent ratings locally when they joined the station in September 1985.[24]

The KRLD 7 pm News

After Channel 33 was sold to Metromedia, its new owners heavily invested in the creation of a news department for the-then KRLD-TV, acquiring modernized technology (including a computer system and several Sony Betacams) for production and newsgathering resources. The station's news staff was based in a small trailer parked within the Harry Hines Boulevard studios before moving into the larger Carpenter Freeway facility shortly before the newscast's launch.

On July 30, 1984, Channel 33 debuted a nightly hour-long newscast at 7:00 pm, which at the time was the only independent television newscast in the market. Its debut was less than auspicious, earning a .7 rating (amounting to less than seven-tenths of 1% of all households in the Dallas–Fort Worth market that watched the premiere broadcast), eventually rising to a peak of 2.0 within several months but still half of the target promised to advertisers. The KRLD 7 pm News would earn two United Press International awards in 1985 for "Best Newscast in Texas" and "Best Spot News" (for its coverage of the 1985 Mesquite tornado).

The news department underwent tumultuous changes in 1986. After original news director Tony deHaro, who had previously served in that same role at KRLD radio prior to Metromedia's purchase of channel 33,[25] was fired by the station, he wrote a scathing letter to D Magazine criticizing the news department and KRLD-TV general manager Ray Schonbak, stating that Schonbak insisted on implementing "sensationalis[tic] and inflammatory" journalism techniques. At the time, station management acquired a state-of-the-art microwave live truck for newsgathering and drafted plans to open a bureau in Fort Worth.

Tribune Broadcasting ownership

On July 1, 1996, Chicago-based Tribune Broadcasting announced that it would acquire Renaissance Communications for $1.13 billion.[51][52]

As a WB affiliate, KDAF benefited from higher-than-average ratings in Dallas–Fort Worth for WB network programs, and Tribune's buying power for syndicated shows also aided the station.[53] Fox Kids was dropped in 1997 and moved to KDFW's sister station KDFI when The WB started its own children's block, Kids' WB.[54] The success of KDAF spurred the launch of the third attempt—and second to become reality—at local news on channel 33, the "News@Nine", in 1999. By 2000, KDAF was considered one of The WB's strongest affiliates.[55] In 2004, the station changed its on-air branding to "Dallas–Fort Worth's WB", de-emphasizing the station's channel number.[56]

On January 24, 2006, Time Warner's Warner Bros. unit and CBS Corporation announced that the two companies would shut down The WB and UPN. In their place, the companies would combine the respective programming of the two networks to create a new "fifth" network called The CW. On that date, The CW also signed a ten-year affiliation agreement with Tribune Broadcasting, under which 16 of the group's 18 WB-affiliated stations—including KDAF—would serve as the network's charter stations.[57][58] KDAF was chosen over CBS-owned KTXA as the higher-rated outlet.

News revival

KDAF revived its plans to re-establish a news department under Tribune ownership later in the 1990s as part of corporate efforts to launch in-house newscasts on the group's WB network affiliates, similar to commitments made by those of the Fox network earlier in the decade. In January 1999, the station began producing a half-hour prime time newscast at 9:00 p.m. on weeknights, the WB 33 News @ Nine.[59] It was first anchored by Patrick Greenlaw and Crystal Thornton, alongside chief meteorologist Steve LaNore and sports director Bob Irzyk. The program was expanded to seven days a week, including Saturdays and Sundays, one year later in January 2000, with Dawn Tongish appointed as the program's weekend anchor; the Monday through Friday editions were then expanded to a full hour the year after that in January 2001,[60] with the weekend newscasts following suit by 2003. The KDAF 9:00 p.m. newscast continually placed a distant second behind KDFW's established hour-long prime time newscast, which had grown to become the ratings leader in that time slot since its debut in mid-1995 upon that station's switch to Fox; in May 2001, it drew half the viewers of the KDFW offering.

In late February 2009, anchors Tom Crespo and Terri Chappell–who had served as main anchors of the program since 2004 and 2003, respectively–were replaced on the weeknight newscasts by existing general assignment reporter Amanda Salinas (later Fitzpatrick) and Walt Maciborski, who joined from WFTS-TV in Tampa.[61]

Nexstar ownership

Sinclair Broadcast Group entered into an agreement to acquire Tribune Media on May 8, 2017, for $3.9 billion, plus the assumption of $2.7 billion in Tribune debt.[77][78] While Sinclair had initially intended on retaining KDAF, Cunningham Broadcasting—a partner licensee with family ties to Sinclair executive chairman David D. Smith—offered to purchase KDAF for $60 million,[79] with Sinclair filing a shared services agreement (SSA) to operate the station.[80] This proposed divestiture was one of several that attracted the scrutiny of FCC chairman Ajit Pai,[81] prompting Sinclair to abandon the Cunningham deal in favor of finding a third party for KDAF.[82][83] The FCC voted to send the entire merger before an evidentiary review hearing,[84] and Pai publicly rejected it.[85] Tribune Media terminated the merger proposal outright on August 9, 2018,[86] filing a breach of contract lawsuit against Sinclair in the process.[87]

Following the Sinclair deal's collapse, Nexstar Media Group—based in the Dallas suburb of Irving—announced their purchase of Tribune Media on December 3, 2018, for $6.4 billion in cash and debt.[88] The sale was completed on September 19, 2019.[89]

Nexstar acquired Tegna, owner of WFAA and KFAA-TV (channel 29), in a deal announced in August 2025[90] and completed in March 2026. The FCC permitted Nexstar to hold three licenses in markets such as Dallas–Fort Worth.[91]

Local programming

On March 13, 2019, the station began a partnership with Urban One, where the morning show from radio station KBFB (97.9 FM), Veda Loca in the Morning, was simulcast on KDAF from 6 to 8 am. During that time, it was known on-air as The Beat on 33.[92] The partnership quietly ended on January 3, 2020, when Veda Loca in the Morning itself was canceled.[93]

On June 1, 2020, the station premiered a daily morning talk show at 10 am called Morning After, which is based on the video podcast of the same name. The show is hosted by Ron Corning and former KDFW anchor Jenny Anchondo.[94]

Currently, the only local news on channel 33 is in the form of 30-second news inserts, introduced in April 2020.

In January 2025, the Texas Rangers announced that as part of a new broadcast deal that would create the Rangers Sports Network, 15 regular-season games would air on KDAF on Friday nights and be syndicated on over-the-air stations across the Rangers' broadcast footprint.